


under me you so quite new

by pendules



Category: Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: First Kiss, First Time, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-16
Updated: 2015-06-16
Packaged: 2018-04-04 15:41:05
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,079
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4143267
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pendules/pseuds/pendules
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>It's gone on too long to not be awkward. It's cold in the drafty church corridors; he knows this but he can't seem to feel it. He thinks he's forgotten what cold even feels like. He thinks he's forgotten the feeling of anything but Ronan Lynch's eyes on him.</i>
</p><p>Based on <a href="http://excelsors.tumblr.com/post/118743263181/okay-but-ronan-going-to-a-midnight-mass-service">this text post</a>.</p>
            </blockquote>





	under me you so quite new

**Author's Note:**

> Title from e.e. cummings.

Midnight, January 1st, and Adam's not asleep. He's restless; it's like there's something alive and humming in his veins. It's not the ley line; Cabeswater has been almost unnervingly quiet for some time now, like they're anticipating something big. It's something else, something inside him buzzing with new potential. Adam's spent all his life dreaming of a future and a freedom that now seems reachable. He wishes he was more sure of how everything else he wants fits into that future, though.

He tries reading, but it's no good; the words slip through his mind like a sieve. He wishes Gansey would call to discuss a new theory about Glendower, always forgetting the time and that normal people actually need to sleep. He wishes Noah would show up and scare the shit out of him and look at him in that way that means _I know_. He even wishes Ronan would come take him to the Barns or to burn something down. But Ronan's —

Downstairs, they're singing hymns. He puts his book aside, and just listens. It's soothing, in a way he never would have expected. Maybe that's the appeal. Maybe it drowns out the rest of the world until everything's clear and still. Until you're sure of your purpose in it.

He falls asleep a short time later, dreaming of driving through the dark for hours and hours, headed towards a destination that is entirely known.

*

He doesn't even think about it when there's a knock on the door. He just drags himself off the bed, forgetting he's not wearing a shirt, not registering how cold the floor is beneath his bare feet, and opens it.

"Hey, I—" Ronan's voice trails off as he catches sight of him. All of him. He's not usually self-conscious about his body, but there's something different about this. Something that feels illicit. At this hour, in this pale light, Ronan seems more _real_ somehow. All of him. Like this time of night belongs to him. Like maybe the world after midnight is just one of his dreams where he can make anything his.

He'd probably start wondering if it's actually a dream if Ronan wasn't in a similar state of disarray. The sleeves of his white dress shirt are rolled up to his elbows, the first two buttons are undone, a dark blue tie is draped carelessly around his neck (he didn't know Ronan owned a tie that wasn't his school tie; he wonders if Gansey bought it for him, or Declan, or if it was his dad's, even).

Ronan's still staring, at his messy hair, at his bare, bare skin. He's only wearing an ancient pair of sweatpants that are hanging dangerously low on his hips, the elastic in the waistband all stretched-out from years of wear. 

Usually when Ronan looks at him like this, he feels like he's behind a sheet of glass. Like he's suspended in amber. He feels safe and in control. Powerful, almost. This is the opposite of that.

It's gone on too long to not be awkward. It's cold in the drafty church corridors; he knows this but he can't seem to feel it. He thinks he's forgotten what cold even feels like. He thinks he's forgotten the feeling of anything but Ronan Lynch's eyes on him.

He finally moves out of the doorway so Ronan can come in. He doesn't; he stays right there.

"It's cold. I should—" he says, turning his back to him, finally, casting around for a shirt that he no longer seems to own.

" _Don't._ " It's so quiet, he'd probably barely hear it even if he had two working ears. And he probably didn't mean to say it at all. This is the first time he's put words to any of the unspoken things Adam has seen in his eyes, the first time he's put words to his want.

He looks back at him. The door's still open but he's standing just inside it now.

" _Ronan_ ," he says. It's not a warning. It's an _Are you sure?_ It's a _We could forget, if you want, we could just undo this entire night._

"When did you decide to stop taking what you want?" There's no malice in it, but it's not what he expected either. 

"I don't just take what I want. I have to _earn_ it first."

"And you don't think you've earned _me_?" Any other time, any other place, he would've taken this as a jab to his ego. A harsh reminder of his own insecurity. But he knows what it really is now. This is a Ronan he doesn't know, except he does. This is the Ronan Gansey knew, before, this is the Ronan who told Adam about Matthew, the one who doesn't know how to give anything but all of himself.

"People aren't things to earn, Ronan."

"You don't have to earn me. You never had to earn me." And that's it; that's what's been keeping him awake. When there's nothing to fight for anymore, what does it matter? It shouldn't be so easy, none of this should be. (And it won't be, he knows, but this, maybe this first step could be. If he just let it. It could be so, so easy. And that's fucking terrifying.)

He's looking at him now, staring right back, eyes on eyes, his search for something to cover up abandoned.

Then he drops his gaze to his bare chest, and then to Ronan's mostly-covered one.

"Well, this hardly seems fair now, does it?" It sounds like the dare he knows Ronan will take it as, just like a suggestion that his dream-plane can't fly without an engine or the BMW can't make it to the moon.

Ronan's eyes narrow, his mouth slightly parted, as if realising that _Yes, he means what I think he means._

He yanks on one end of the tie until it falls to the floor. Then, slowly, carefully, he starts working on the third button.

Until Adam moves closer and shoves the door shut behind him and brushes away his hands in one movement. Ronan goes so, so still, like he's stopped breathing completely.

His hands are steady, as steady as if this was just another task to be done, from Cabeswater, from one of his jobs. But Ronan's skin is hot under his hands and he can feel it, his frustration that the touch is so slight. A frustration that seems to vibrate through him and into Adam.

His hands are still clutching the front of his shirt when he leans in and kisses the side of Ronan's neck, near to where the claws of his tattoo protrude. Ronan makes a moan that feels like it's being pulled out of his chest. And then his hands are running up Adam's naked back, free, desperate, holding on to him so tightly.

That's when the glass shatters. 

Ronan throws his head back to provide better access to his throat, and he's going to have marks in the morning, Adam knows. Adam drags his mouth down his exposed chest, producing a sharp gasp. He finally gets his shirt unbuttoned and untucked and Ronan removes his hands from his back to toss it off his shoulders.

They look at each other again, both shirtless, both wild-eyed and hungry. Both afraid.

Adam presses into him again, wraps his arms loosely around his waist, closes his eyes, breathes against his neck. Ronan runs a hand up his neck into his hair, holding him in place. Time moves or doesn't move. The seasons change and pass them by. Flowers grow and wither and die and grow again. They don't move. They're trapped in amber. In one moment. In all the moments of all the ages of the world.

Adam wants to stay here forever. But that would be too easy.

Ronan gently grasps his chin between his thumb and forefinger and guides his mouth up to meet his own. 

Ronan still tastes like red wine and something sacred; something sweet and something bitter; something familiar and something made new.

He kisses him like it's the only thing he was meant to do. Like when he races, or when he fights. When he dreams. Never incomplete. Never half-hearted. He kisses like he dreams like he loves. With every part of himself.

Adam doesn't know if he could bear it.

He spins them around so he can walk Ronan backwards to the bed. He lets Adam push him down onto it, lets him climb on top of him.

Adam kisses his mouth, his jaw, his neck, traces the lines of his tattoo. Kisses his way down his chest and stomach and then - stops. Sits up for a moment, straddling his hips. Just breathing in and out.

It's then when he realises, _This is it, this is when it all changes._ He can either go all in or stop now and either way, it will never be the same again. Ronan's looking up at him, and his eyes say, _No half-measures. Not anymore._

"Okay," Adam says, to himself, to Ronan, to the universe.

His hands find the button on Ronan's slacks for the first time. Pops it, unzips them. He gets his pants and his underwear halfway down his thighs with one tug and then he takes him in his mouth. All in. No half-measures.

Ronan makes a low sound in his throat, fisting his hands in the sheets on either side of him.

He takes a deep breath when Adam finds a steady rhythm and brings a hand up to loosely tangle in his hair.

He's quiet after that and it feels reverent, it feels like they're caught in another pocket of time that belongs to only them.

He can feel when he gets to the edge though, can feel his tension before the release. 

When Ronan says, "I'm gonna—", he doesn't pull off.

He crawls back up his body to kiss him, tuck his face into his neck, and then Ronan's flipping them over and his hand is trailing its way down his stomach and under the thin fabric of his sweatpants. Ronan's hands are scarred and strong and they can hold dreams and create life. It's almost too much that those hands want to touch him so badly. But he lets him, lets him because he knows now that he never had to _earn_ this; you don't earn love, love is selfless and he's never believed that true selflessness was possible. But this is - they are. Adam is never going to be selfish with him. 

Adam comes between them without warning, and Ronan laughs breathlessly into his mouth. He's never seen him so happy; this is another Ronan he doesn't know. He kisses him back, slow and lazy, for a while, wondering if he's the same person he was the day before, the year before.

They don't say anything. Adam falls asleep with his head on Ronan's chest, his mind free and blank and clear.

*

They're having cereal for breakfast. All casual.

"Hey, I didn't tell you before," Ronan says. "Happy New Year."

"Well, you were kind of distracted, if I recall correctly." Adam can't help himself from raising a suggestive eyebrow.

"You really should warn a guy before you answer the door looking all debauched," Ronan says, matter-of-factly.

" _Debauched?_ Are you serious?"

"I am always _completely_ serious, Parrish." 

"You know, you can't call me that anymore."

"What, are we getting married?"

Adam almost spits out his cereal.

" _What?_ That's not what I— And please, you know you'd take _my_ name."

"Why would I take _your_ name?" He sounds actually offended now.

"Maybe you'd hyphenate," Adam suggests, seriously.

"So, if I have to take your name, _you_ get to tell Gansey about this."

"Oh my God, I didn't even think—" It's almost too horrifying to imagine.

"Please don't take the big guy's name in vain in his own house."

"Really? That's what you're concerned about? Blasphemy?"

"What do you mean?" Ronan looks genuinely confused.

"I mean, that's probably not the most grievous sin to occur in this apartment in the last twelve hours."

"Well, _that_ was technically your fault. So, you get to tell Gansey."

"We don't have to do that _right now_ , though, do we?"

"No, I don't see why we can't wait a few hours. Or days—"

Adam's already grabbing his wrist and pulling him in the direction of the bed. 

"Happy New Year," he tells him, smiling against his lips.


End file.
